Nerve Center Read online

  They had used the plane’s command computer’s simulator module to run through a few mock takeoffs before starting down the field. The colonel realized now that he had failed to authorize the computer to switch back into real mode for takeoff. Obviously, Breanna had counted on the Megafortress’s safety protocols to get them off the ground safely.

  Which, of course, they had.

  “That’s dirty pool, Breanna,” Dog told her. “You shut off the engines.”

  “No. I just dialed them down to ten percent. You weren’t paying attention,” she added. There was no trace of humor in her voice now—she was the veteran flight instructor verbally whacking a greenie pilot. “You didn’t ask for a check, which you should have, because as you can see, my screen clearly indicates the proper output. Inattention is a killer. In any airplane except the Megafortress, you would have bought it.”

  “Any other plane and there’s no way you could have done that,” said Dog angrily. “You tricked me with a bogus reading.”

  “Your screen clearly says sim mode. You didn’t go through the checks properly,” she said. “This was a dramatic way to point that out. I’m sorry, Daddy,” she added, her voice suddenly changing.

  The change in tone killed him.

  “No, you were absolutely one-hundred-percent right,” said Bastian. He practically spat the words through his clenched teeth, then sighed. She was right, damn it—he hadn’t dotted his stinking i’s and it could have cost him his plane, his crew, and his life. “Can I get control back?”

  Breanna reached to her panel. “On my mark, Daddy.”

  “Don’t call me Daddy.”

  Bunker B, Dreamland

  9 January, 1415

  THE FLIGHTHAWK AND F-16 SWIRLED IN THE SKY, CAT and dog locked in a ferocious match. Neither could gain enough of an advantage over the other to end the battle. Then the big screen at the front of the room flashed white and a loud pffffffff cracked the speakers—Captain Madrone had cut the feed.

  “I said, knock it off” Madrone stood back from the console, folding his arms in front of his chest. At five eight and perhaps 140 in a winter uniform with boots, thermals, and two sweaters, Madrone hardly cut an imposing figure. Even for an engineer he was considered shy and quiet, and most people at Dreamland who knew him even casually could mention several nervous habits, beginning with his nail-biting. But somewhere in the recesses of his personality lurked a young lieutenant who had faced down a pair of tanks in Iraq. The same ferocious snap that had led his team to wipe out the tanks with nothing more than hand grenades now brought the joint-services team that had been fighting the mock battle on a new simulation system to rapid attention.

  Except for the two men at the heart of the battle, that is.

  “You fucking cheated,” Zen told Mack, tossing off his Flighthawk control helmet. A control cable caught the custom-built device about a millimeter from the ground, just barely keeping it from turning into a bucket of ridiculously expensive but busted computer chips.

  “I didn’t cheat,” said Smith, standing from his station on Madrone’s left. “I just flew under the radar coverage. How is that cheating?”

  “You flew beyond the parameters of the plane,” said Zen. “You pulled over ten g’s twice. And besides, no way no how could you have gotten past the F-15’s at Mark Seven.”

  “The computer let me take the g’s,” said Mack. “As for the F-15’s, where were they?”

  “He got past us,” admitted Captain Paul Owens, who’d been handling the F-15 combat air sweep from one of the back benches. “The damn simulator has a hole in the radar coverage big enough to fly a 747 through. You can’t see anything under a thousand feet.”

  “Gentlemen, please.” Dr. Ray Rubeo, one of the scientists overseeing the simulation, leaned over the railing at the back of the room. His voice had the world-weary tone a kindergarten teacher would use at the end of a long week. “I believe we have our data for today. I suggest everyone take the afternoon off to play with their Tinkertoys. Live-fire exercise in the morning. Tomorrow, please, keep the WWF routine on the ground.”

  Rubeo turned and walked from the room, shuddering slightly at the doorway, as if shaking a great chill from his body.

  “Easier to walk away than fix the holes in the sim program,” muttered Zen.

  “I think he was right,” said Madrone. “We all pretty much know what we have to do tomorrow.”

  He turned to Captain Rosenstein and Lieutenant Garuthers, who were to pilot the actual helicopters they would test tomorrow. The Army commanders were here to test new helicopter upgrades and combat communications in something approaching real conditions; they cared little for what they called the “Hair Force testosterone show,” and were only too happy to knock off early.

  Knife and Zen, meanwhile, traded snipes across the floor.

  “You were lucky today,” said Zen. “Tomorrow we’re in real planes.”

  “Tomorrow I’m going to kick your ass all over town, you peahead loser,” promised Knife. “I can do things in the MiG that would tear an F-16 apart, even with Dreamland’s mods.”

  “1 can nail a MiG with my eyes closed,” said Zen.

  “We’ll see,” said Mack. He popped the CD that had recorded his part of the exercise out of the console near him and left the room, practically whistling.

  Zen wheeled toward his helmet, still shaking his head. He picked it up and handed it to Jennifer Gleason, one of the computer scientists on the Flighthawk project. Gleason smiled at him, pushing a strand of her long, brownish-blond hair back behind her ear. The computer screens bathed her face and neck an almost golden yellow; she looked like a nymph emerging from bed. A genius nymph—Dr. Gleason was among the world’s leading authorities on AI circuitry and intelligence chips—but a nymph nonetheless.

  Madrone stared at the curve of her two breasts in the slightly oversized black T-shirt she wore. Lowering his eyes to her hips, he watched them sway slightly while their owner went over some of the details of the encounter with Jeff. Madrone turned back to his station, pretending to sort through his papers, pretending not to be driven to sense-crushing distraction by an expert on gallium arsenic chips.

  “We’re seeing you tonight, right?”

  “Uh, yeah,” Madrone said, still distracted.

  “You okay, Kevin?” Zen asked.

  “I’m fine. Have to, uh, sort all this out, you know.”

  “Yeah. Listen, don’t worry about the holes in the simulation program. Jennifer will work them out. Nail’s bleeding,” Zen added, smiling. “Bad habit.”

  Madrone nodded sheepishly. Stockard gripped the wheels of his chair and rolled himself back a foot or so. The others had left the control area, but Zen still made a show of looking around, a car thief checking if the coast were clear. “Listen, I have to give you a heads-up on tonight. Bree’s playing matchmaker.” Zen rolled his eyes and shrugged apologetically. “You know how it goes.”

  Madrone suddenly had a vision of Jennifer Gleason sitting on the Stockards’ couch in a short, wispy skirt, breasts loose beneath a silk white polo shirt.

  “Abby Miller,” added Jeff.

  The vision evaporated.

  “I’m sorry, Zen. What’d you say?” asked Madrone.

  “Abby Miller. She’s a civilian. She works over at Nellis in the public affairs office. I think she used to be a reporter or worked for a magazine or something. I’m not exactly sure how Bree first met her. You know Rap—she knows just about everybody. Uh, nice personality.”

  Madrone folded his thumb beneath his other fingers, holding his fist close to his side. “If Breanna likes her, she’s okay,” he said.

  “That’s the spirit.” Zen gave him another sardonic grin, then began wheeling away. “Seven P.M. sharp. Bree’ll have dinner timed out to the half second. Bring the wine.”

  Madrone suddenly felt real fear. “Wine? What kind?”

  But Zen was halfway out the door and didn’t respond.

  Aboard Raven

&nbsp
; 9 January, 1415

  NOWHERE IS IT WRITTEN THAT POINTY-NOSE FIGHTER jocks are better than all other pilots. No military regulation declares that just because a man—or woman—regularly subjects himself to eight or nine negative g’s and hurtles his body through the air at several times the speed of sound is he—or she—better than those who proceed in a more considered fashion. Not one sheet in the mountains of official Air Force paperwork covering piloting and flying in general includes the words “Teen-jet jocks are superior to all others.”

  But every go-fast zippersuit who ever strapped a brain bucket on his head believes it is true. He—or she—did not get to fly the world’s most advanced warbirds by being merely good. Personal preferences and luck aside, front-line fighter pilots in the U.S. Air Force are the best of the best. And most would have no problem telling you that.

  Lieutenant Colonel Bastian was, more than anything else, a front-line fighter jock. It did not matter that his last mission in combat had been more than five years ago during the Gulf War. Nor did it matter that that mission was actually in a bomber—the F-15E Strike Eagle, at the time one of the newest swords in the weapons trove. It did not even matter that his present post as a commander—a ground commander—was several hundred times more important than anything he had done during the war.

  What mattered was that he was a fighter pilot. Dog thought like a fighter pilot. He talked like a fighter pilot. He walked—some might say swaggered—like a fighter pilot. One who had seen combat. One who had big hours in F-16’s as well as F-15’s. A fighter pilot who had flown F-4’s, F-111’s, and even an A-10A once or twice. A fighter pilot who had taken the stick of an F-117 and a turn in an F-22 demonstrator. In short, a zippersuit who could fly and had flown anything the Air Force had to offer, and had done it very well.

  Except for today, when he was sitting at the helm of an antiquated, out-of-date, obsolete, lumbering, slow-as-a-cow-going-backward BUFF. A plane as old as he was, and twenty times as creaky.

  Actually, if it had been simply a B-52, Dog might not have felt as bad. The Stratofortress’s vintage controls took a hell of a lot of getting used to. Levers and knobs stuck out at all angles, the dash looked like the display case in a clock shop, and there was no way to get comfortable in the seat until a dozen hard landings form-fitted your butt. But the B-52 he was flying had been rebuilt from the fuel tanks outward as an EB-52. Rebuilt and reskinned, reengined and recontrolled, the Megafortress retained the soul of the old machine—the most capable and durable bomber of the Cold War era. But she flexed twenty-first-century muscles. It was like having the wisdom and experience of a sixty-five-year-old—and the muscles and reflexes of a twenty-one-year-old young buck.

  As Breanna somewhat gushingly put it after they landed.

  “I can do without the metaphors, thank you, Captain Stockard,” snapped Dog, unhooking himself from the seat restraints.

  Or rather, trying to unhook himself. Damn, he couldn’t even undo a stinking belt buckle today.

  “All I’m saying, Daddy, is that Raven takes a little getting used to. It’s not your average F-16. I know that with a few more flights, you’ll be right on top of it.”

  The restraint finally snapped clean. Dog unfolded himself from the seat, struggling to maintain what little was left of his dignity as he left the plane. The other crew members—he had foolishly agreed to fly with a navigator and a weapons officer—wisely made their way out the ventral hatch well ahead of him.

  “Daddy—”

  “And another thing, Captain.” Bastian twisted at the back of the flight deck before starting downward. “Do not, under any circumstances, while we are on duty—at work—ever refer to me as Daddy, Dad, Pop, Poppy, Father, Papa, or anything in that vein. Got it?”

  “Sir, yes, sir.”

  The Megafortress’s stealthy carbon-resin skin was specially treated to withstand high temperatures. The runway apron, however, seemed to melt as Dog stalked from the plane, which was being refueled for a flight by another crew. He headed toward the ramp to the Megafortress’s subterranean hangar, where a state-of-the-art simulator waited to replay his flying mistakes in bold colors.

  A black Jimmy SUV with a row of flashing blue lights whipped off the access ramp to his right, speeding toward him. Dog stopped, thankful for the interruption, even if the flashing lights boded a problem. The Jimmy belonged to his head of base security, Captain Danny Freah. Danny was loath to use the blue lights—he claimed they made the truck look like it was leading a fire department parade—so something serious must be up.

  But instead of Freah, Chief Master Sergeant Terence “Ax” Gibbs pulled down the driver’s-side window as the truck rolled up.

  “Colonel, you have visitors,” said the sergeant.

  “Visitors who?” snapped Dog.

  “Secretary-to-be Keesh for one,” said Ax. “A whole pack of muckety-mucks nipping at his heels.”

  An ex-Congressman, John Keesh was the new Administration’s nominee for Defense Secretary. Bastian knew him vaguely from Washington, but hadn’t seen or spoken to him for months. He was expected to be confirmed next week.

  Last November’s elections had completely rearranged the defense landscape, removing Bastian’s chief patron and booster, National Security Director Deborah O’Day. Her likely replacement, Philip Freeman, was unknown to Bastian personally. The only ranking holdover from O’Day’s staff was Jed Barclay, a young Harvard whiz kid who had more pimples than experience. His official title was Deputy NSC Assistant for Technology and Foreign Relations, though he had been more of a freelance troubleshooter for O’Day.

  “Why the hell didn’t somebody tell me Keesh was coming?” Bastian asked Ax.

  “Advanced warning systems completely smoked,” admitted the sergeant. “Captain Freah’s already giving them the two-dollar tour.”

  Taken off guard, Dog settled for the passenger’s seat as he contemplated what the surprise VIP tour might mean. That was a mistake, as Ax’s screeching takeoff quickly confirmed. Bastian grabbed desperately for the door handle, trying to keep himself from shooting through the windshield as the sergeant threw the truck into reverse and whipped back toward the access road back to the main area of the base. Gibbs had no peer when it came to organizing an administrative staff and handling the paperwork of command. Driving was a different story.

  “Flight go okay?” asked the sergeant. His voice sounded innocent, but Dog suspected it was anything but.

  “It did not. Keep your eyes on the road.”

  “Yes, sir. Papers for you to sign,” added the sergeant, thumbing toward the console between them where three thick folders were wedged tight.

  “I’ll read them if you’ll slow down,” said Dog as Gibbs took a turn on two wheels.

  “Ah, I keep telling you, you don’t have to read the stuff I give you. Requisitions for toilet paper and that kind of stuff.” Gibbs jerked the Jimmy onto the road to Taj, Dreamland’s command complex. “Anything important I forge.”

  “I hope you forged me a will,” said Dog, gripping his handhold tighter.

  “‘Xcuse me, Colonel?”

  “Just watch the road.” Dog finally managed to buckle his seat belt. “Now why the hell didn’t you radio me when the Secretary’s plane was inbound? And didn’t someone on General Magnus’s staff call to give us a heads-up?”

  “Well, thing is, Colonel, number one, the Secretary didn’t come by plane, he came via limo from Nellis. Second thing is, he just showed up there too, and made a beeline out to us without telling the base commander. Everybody is peed. General Magnus’s staff didn’t know anything about it. I think Captain Granson may lose a bar over it,” added Ax. “Sergeant Fulton says it was his turn to keep track of the brass’s brass.”

  Dog’s stern frown cut Gibbs off in mid-chortle. Granson was an aide to Lieutenant General Magnus, Colonel Bastian’s immediate superior in the streamlined chain of command established when Dreamland and its Whiplash Action Team became operational some months ago. Until the
last election, Magnus had seemed on the short track to head the Air Force and maybe the Joint Chiefs. The fact that Keesh didn’t give him a heads-up before inspecting one of his commands obviously meant he was off the track, at least for now.

  “Last but not least,” added Gibbs, “you left explicit orders not to be disturbed.”

  “Ax, if the President came, would you have radioed me?”

  “Probably. Ought to be down in the Mudroom by now,” added Gibbs, jerking the SUV to a stop so quickly it was a wonder the air bags didn’t deploy. “Senator Densmore looks like he had a bumpy flight, Colonel. Might offer him a cocktail. Also, Congresswoman Timmons is wearing very expensive perfume, so she may have intentions. She’s a widow, you know.”

  “Anything else, Ax?”

  “Just my papers, sir.”

  Dog frowned at the folder. “I have to read them.”

  “Seriously, Colonel, they’re just routine. You know, sir, if I can say something out of line—”

  “You were born out of line, Sergeant.”

  “You’re wasting your time on a lot of diddly-shit with the papers. I’ll bring the stuff you really need to deal with to your attention. As for the rest—”

  “Not my way, Ax.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The Mudroom—only Gibbs called it that—was a secure command center on basement level three of the Taj. Dog found Danny regaling the visitors with tapes of Dreamland’s successful Whiplash raid into Libya three months before.

  Not too subtle.

  Dog stood for a moment at the railing on the observer’s deck at the rear of the room, watching the tape run on the composite screen. The entire twelve-by-twenty-one-foot surface was given over to a feed from one of the Flighthawks as it surveyed the bunker complex where American prisoners were being held. Keesh, five lawmakers from Congress, and an aide were standing about five feet from the screen, completely mesmerized by the action. A roof began moving on the left; puffs of smoke and small flames, carefully rendered by the equivalent of more than 250 laptop TFT displays, filled the big screen. The camera veered off, and Whiplash’s assault team arrived in a combat-outfitted Osprey at the left corner of the screen.